


A Simple Flavor

by AceTrainerAlicia



Series: The Adventures of Jaina: A Faith Renewed [18]
Category: Runescape
Genre: Bad Cooking, F/M, Fatherhood, Pregnancy, Tiny Mahjarrat too
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-23
Updated: 2017-07-23
Packaged: 2018-12-05 21:54:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11586948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AceTrainerAlicia/pseuds/AceTrainerAlicia
Summary: In which Azzanadra's attempt to cook goes about as well as expected.





	A Simple Flavor

Azzanadra surveyed the larder shelves, pondering which of the many unfamiliar items he should take and what needed closer inspection. He must think before he acted, deduce what the best way to proceed was before he attempted anything; this would not be a repeat of that day so many thousand years ago. This time he would make sure he accomplished what he set out to do.

Never had he thought he would ever need to attempt to cook, not again, but the opportunity to be an active part of his children’s upbringing was not something he would pass up, and part of that responsibility involved feeding them and feeding them properly. Jaina would not always be able to cook for them, nor would her butler; he would need to be prepared to feed them as needed—and since Wahisietel had informed him about the human tradition of bringing mothers breakfast in bed when they were sick or bedridden, this would be a welcome surprise for Jaina when the sun rose and she awoke.

The question thus became what that breakfast in bed should entail. It must be healthy, containing meat, fruits, and vegetables, and she’d had more than enough sweets for quite some time—the many reserves of chocolate bars and powders in her larder were far more than a single human needed! And there must also be enough of it for all three of them, given how hungry the children appeared to be so far. He was not going to make a stew this time, either…

Perhaps the sort of simple meal that temple students would have eaten in the days of the empire would be suitable? Bread, cheese, fish or sausage, fruit, roast vegetables… yes, that would be reasonable enough to prepare… Azzanadra recalled the myriad temple cooks hard at work in the kitchens, slicing vegetables and molding bread all at once, humming as they dutifully worked to prepare the day’s meals.

Immediately he set about scouring the larder for every fruit and vegetable he could find, laying them out neatly on the countertop. Some he recognized from having seen them on banquet tables and in market stalls—apples, plums, peaches, and even a pomegranate—but others he was more unsure about. Were those brown vegetables onions or potatoes? Were those particular green ones peas or stringbeans? The only thing he was certain of was that there was no trace of the ubiquitous and all too recognizable cabbage among the assortment.

Deciding he would select which fruits and vegetables to make use of later, Azzanadra surmised that it would be simple enough to start with bread—all that was needed was flour and water, and he could deal with the rest while it baked. From the larder he fetched a pot of flour and overturned it onto the countertop on the other side of the sink, and then carefully poured a jug of water over the heap of dusty white powder.

The resulting mixture ended up as an uneven, sticky, squishy mess, and he had to make use of his hands to try to even it out a bit. He had to add a bit more water to the mix before all of the flour was subsumed into it, but at last he managed to produce a fairly cohesive lump of unbaked bread. Yes, this would do nicely… At once he turned the oven on and confidently placed the raw lump in to bake, rinsing his hands before returning to the larder.

He found a few wheels of cheese and glass bottles of milk that were kept chilled by a magical icy aura about that particular shelf, and there was a frozen box at the bottom of the larder containing various cuts of meat and fish preserved in ice. Only a few small portions of meat or fish would be needed compared to the fruits and vegetables—four would be enough for the children’s appetites, he decided as he selected four different fish.

It was only as he carried the frozen fish over to the stovetop that Azzanadra realized that some kind of a pot or a pan would be needed, and not a cauldron or a deep stew pot either. Setting the fish down on the countertop along with the milk and cheese, he searched the cabinets for pots and pans, which kept clanging loudly as he searched through them—his gaze darted around the room wildly at the sounds, and he hoped fervently that the noise had not woken Jaina or any of her pets.

Whether most humans were so disorganized with their kitchen supplies or if it was merely Jaina’s natural disinclination for domestic duties at play here, or if her butler had left them like this, he was unsure, but the sea of pots and pans seemed chaotically tossed together without rhyme or reason. Finally he found a round shallow pan that looked suitable—a larger one for the vegetables, as well as a smaller one for the fish—and breathed a deep sigh of relief. The rest of his task could be completed quietly and peacefully now.

Setting the stovetop alight, he placed the fish in the smaller pan and left them on to cook, and returned his attention to the vegetables. At least one of the ones he chose would need to be green, and some of them would need to be chopped into small pieces for cooking if he recalled correctly. Perhaps he should select from the green ones first… He set about peeling the leaves off a thick green one that slightly resembled a longer, thinner cabbage and layered them neatly in the bottom of the larger pan. He had seen many dishes at banquets served on similar beds of green leaves, and while he could not imagine that the presentation of this dish would be quite as picturesque, it should at least look somewhat appealing to the human eye like this.

Beneath the green leaves, the core of the plant was long, thin, and covered in thin white silky strands and pale yellow seeds. Azzanadra could not be sure if these seeds were edible to humans, as he could recall that some plants had seeds that were not safe to eat, so he discarded the core and set about slicing the other vegetables. Firstly he saw to the rounded brown vegetables, which he presumed were potatoes, and the round red ones which he knew for sure were tomatoes. Then he sliced a longer, rounded purple one, which he had seen on banquet tables often enough to recognize as eggplant. He presumed both the white and brown bulb-shaped ones were onions, so he added several of each after slicing them in half. Lastly came a jar full of white beans and the small, thin green pods which were either peapods or stringbeans—well, they were both green, and both most assuredly healthy.

Satisfied with the filled pan, Azzanadra left the vegetables to roast and gathered up the fruit. These would not need cooking; they could simply be served fresh in a bowl mixed together. As he set to work once more, he began singing an Infernal hymn about the hands that did great work in Zaros’ name to complement the task at hand.

He was so focused on slicing the fruits as he sang that at first he did not think to acknowledge the voice joining in midway through, but as he finished the next verse, his keen ears picked up on it and he turned towards the sound of the other voice. To his surprise, his tiny counterpart was there, seated on the edge of the sink and watching him intently. “Might all this be part of the great works done for our lord, then?” the doll inquired.

Azzanadra was rather taken aback, and it took him a moment to answer. “Indeed, I am seeing to it that Jaina and the children are properly fed—a most crucial matter.”

“A worthy endeavor indeed!” Tiny Azzanadra declared, surveying the pile of sliced fruit. “She is still sleeping now—perhaps I can be of some assistance?”

“Hmph,” grumbled another tiny voice, and Azzanadra looked down to see Tiny Hazeel sitting atop the kitchen table, arms crossed. “I was busy planning until your infernal singing interrupted my thoughts. Why would you busy yourself with such disgusting work anyway?”

“Your ‘planning’ has borne no results whatsoever, you tiny-horned fool,” Tiny Azzanadra retorted as he carried a strawberry over to the pile of fruit. “I have been tirelessly working to do my lord’s great work, small as my tasks may be!”

“What brings the both of you here before sunrise, then?” Azzanadra questioned, looking for a bowl to put the fruit in. “And where is the construct of Lucien?”

“Hiding from the lava beast, most likely,” Tiny Hazeel snorted. “Of course, the lava beast never wakes up before sunrise anyway, but the fool does not need to know that!”

“I saw him sleeping on the hairbrush he claims to be his throne, actually.” Tiny Azzanadra studied the strawberry closely. “Hmmm, where would I find a tiny implement to slice through this fruit…”

“I have the situation fully under control,” Azzanadra said bluntly as he fetched a suitable bowl, bristling at the notion that he would need assistance from a doll of himself to get the job done. “You need not interfere.” To think that a silly likeness of himself could ever strike a blow to his pride… how he would have laughed at the notion that such a thing could ever happen had he heard it in the days of the empire! And how he would have laughed at the notion that he would find himself cooking breakfast for the human he loved, for his children, as well…

He was already setting about slicing the last few fruits and filling the bowl, trying to stay focused on the task at hand. As he did he could smell that the fish were nearly cooked, and the vegetables were exuding their own scents as they roasted, though he could not identify which smell was from each. Surely these aromas would be delicious to a human…

“No task is too great for the Pontifex Minimus!” Tiny Azzanadra puffed out his chest and proceeded to painstakingly pick up the fruit pieces to fill the bowl piece by piece. “Behold my might!”

The Mahjarrat sighed exasperatedly at his small counterpart and picked him up off the pile of fruit. “Do cease with the distractions,” he said sternly, deftly placing the little doll on his shoulder. “This task is nearly complete, and I must maintain my focus!”

“Put me down!” Tiny Azzanadra protested, clearly having taken a blow to his pride as well. “I may be small, but I am no less up to the task than my larger counterpart!”

“Stop squirming and let me stay focused.” Azzanadra knew he had to keep his composure and pay attention to his work; he did not remove his gaze from the stovetop. The fish, he saw, were still raw on one side; they appeared to need to be turned over, and he could smell them faintly burning… but when he grabbed a wooden spoon to use to do so, he found that they were firmly stuck to the bottom of the pan. Although it was not difficult to extricate them, his efforts to do so resulted in two of the fish messily being cut into haphazard pieces and the spoon handle breaking clean off, and he grumbled in annoyance as he froze the spoon back together with a quick ice spell. The fish were charred and blackened as well on the side they had been stuck to the pan—but how? Surely he had done everything correctly…

“Some Zarosian might you have,” scoffed Tiny Hazeel, his arms still crossed. “How hard is it to remove small fleshy objects from a shallow pan without breaking things?”

Azzanadra ignored him and focused instead on removing the vegetables from their pan, as they looked and smelled fully cooked. They too appeared to be stuck to the bottom of the pan—what had happened to cause this? How had they too become stuck and slightly blackened? Was the heat of the stovetop too much? He had to mutter a prayer under his breath to calm his nerves, as this inexplicable result was irritating him more greatly than either of the dolls had so far. Confusedly he scraped them onto a plate with the broken spoon and his claws, and though they hardly looked neat or picturesque upon the bed of awkwardly peeling leaves, he found himself at least relieved that they looked far less burned on the bottom than the fish did.

His keen olfactory sense briefly picked up on the faint odor of something aflame, and he quickly checked the fish, which had become stuck to the pan again. Fortunately he managed to keep them mostly still intact and not pry them loose too forcefully, and they were not burned on that side, but rather looked and smelled fully cooked—so where had that smell come from? Had it been a mere phantom from the fish burning?

Tiny Azzanadra chose that moment to try to climb down his robe. “I shall bring the finished dishes upstairs!”

“No,” Azzanadra said stiffly, tucking the little doll firmly into the collar of his robe. “Everything must be finished, and then I will bring it to her on a tray!”

“It will save time,” Tiny Azzanadra insisted, trying to squirm his way out of the fabric. “I am still strong! I am Zaros’ tiniest champion! I can carry things three times my size just as well as you can!”

“No one is arguing that you lack strength, my small counterpart,” the Mahjarrat retorted exasperatedly, “but I intend to complete this task to the end without help! I must be able to accomplish my fatherly duties on my own!”

“Look at you,” Tiny Hazeel scoffed, casually kicking his stubby legs from where he sat on the table’s edge. “You really are the same, aren’t you? Of course, with your insufferable attitude, even you can’t stand yourself…”

“You stay out of this!” Tiny Azzanadra shot back, scrambling up his larger counterpart’s face to perch atop the prongs of his hat. “I do not see you trying to help out with the children!”

“Stop that!” Azzanadra found himself taken off guard at the sensation of the small thing grabbing at his hood and climbing up his face, annoyed and confused at how a mere talking doll could have gotten on his nerves so much even as he spoke. “You obstructed my vision! That was a needlessly distracting thing to—” He stopped short as the unmistakable reek of smoke reached his nose. “Wait…”

Something was definitely burning now, and he swiftly turned around to search the stovetop for the source of it—but it clicked in his mind before he had even looked far. The bread! He must have left the bread in too long.

Quickly he opened the oven door as his tiny counterpart cried out in alarm and clung tightly to his hat. At once he saw that most of the bread had fallen through the gaps in the oven rack, creating an unsightly splattered scorched mess. What little cohesive parts of it remained were flat and burned to black on the bottom, with only a few spots of brown on the top. Although he could remove the blackened chunks of it with his bare hands, doing so would likely mean he would bend the oven rack out of shape, and there was no way any of it would be edible to a human.

Shaking his head, he turned off the oven’s heat and immediately set about using ice magic to commence cleaning up the mess. At least he could take solace in the fact that this was not a complete failure; he had managed to successfully prepare most of the meal, and it should still be enough even without the bread.

~***~

“Why did you go up there?” the adventurer asked, sitting up a bit straighter against the headboard of her bed. “Did you also want to practice crossing the falls for the Ritual in the future?”

“Actually, I was quite daring! I simply wanted to see a muspah.” Akthanakos uttered a dry chuckle. “Many of our legends spoke of them congregating near the Falls of Mah, and I was sure I would get to see one there when I became old enough! My mother used to tell me the legends often to try to remind me that I was better off not encountering one, but my youthful eagerness to know if they were real or not did not wane… Ah, but I am digressing!”

He rested comfortably in his chair and crossed his legs. “So up the mountainside above the village the six of us went—me, Azzanadra, Alotor, Sliske, Wahisietel, and Jhallan—up to a much smaller river of lava that was neither as wide as the Falls nor possessing a dangerous steep drop! But it was far from safe, and Jhallan still did not particularly want to try it. Sliske, at least, had the decency to get his rock first and be the first to try…”

He went on to describe how the lava-surfing excursion had seemingly been going well at first, but then Alotor slipped and almost fell into the lava, and Azzanadra almost lost his balance catching him, and then Sliske’s rock had started to melt just as he was going too fast to steer…

As she listened, Jaina found herself wishing that Sliske had fallen into the lava then and there, but she shuddered at the thought almost as soon as it crossed her mind. That was a horrible thing to wish on a child, even one who would grow up to become the sick bastard who had hurt so many for his own amusement, and she hated even having considered it!

“That was the first time I can remember that we ever saw Sliske so frightened,” Akthanakos was saying, his gaze and tone both somber. “He was in the middle of the river on a rapidly sinking rock, and Azzanadra was trying to carry Alotor to safety on his back, and Wahisietel couldn’t reach us, and I was trying to look for a safe spot to jump off my own rock… but Azzanadra’s quick thinking did ultimately save us all! He managed to conjure a few rocks big enough to use as stepping stones, and Wahisietel and I helped him do it to the best our our abilities, and with our combined efforts we all managed to make it out of the lava river! Our mothers were not happy, to say the least, and rightly so…” He shook his head. “Sliske even ran straight for the village the moment he was safe without so much as a thank you! He pinned the blame on Wahisietel for coming up with the idea too, and their mother believed him!”

Jaina could only imagine how worried the Mahjarrat must have been at almost losing their children like that, though it didn’t surprise her that Azzanadra had been looking out for them even as a child. She wondered how well he had looked after his little brother—and what Alotor had been like, but she wasn’t sure if he would be comfortable talking about him or if the thought still pained him.

A knock suddenly came at her bedroom door, snapping her out of her thoughts. “Oh! Who’s there?”

The door opened and Azzanadra came in with a tray in his hands and the tiny version of him riding on his head. “Good morning, my dear. It is good to see you awake!”

She eyed him oddly as she looked at the tray he carried. “Good morning, Azzanadra. What’s that you have there?”

“I have prepared you breakfast,” he replied, crossing to her bedside to hand her the tray. “Behold! There was supposed to be bread as well, but that… did not turn out well, sad to say.”

“Oh my!” Akthanakos exclaimed, craning his neck to try to get a good look at the tray. “This is quite the surprise…”

“Indeed, a surprise I hope you will find welcome!” Tiny Azzanadra scrambled down his larger counterpart’s robe and leapt towards the bed, landing face-first in Jaina’s pillow.

Jaina blinked and looked over the tray as she balanced it carefully on her lap. Her mouth was already watering at the smell of the fish, although they smelled better than they looked for sure—some of them were awkwardly shredded, and some were partially blackened on one side. She couldn’t make out everything that was in the suspicious heap of mixed vegetables that looked to be half squished and fused together, but the heaping bowl of fruit chunks certainly looked quite good.

She could feel the gazes of both the Mahjarrat—and Tiny Azzanadra climbing up her arm to perch on her shoulder—as she tentatively sampled a bit of the pile of vegetables. Almost immediately she got a startling surprise as she bit into a large chunk of garlic, peel and all—peel and all? Gagging, she had to hastily spit it back out again.

Azzanadra looked alarmed. “Is something wrong?”

The adventurer coughed and shook her head. “I-I’m fine… did you put unpeeled garlic in this?”

“Unpeeled?” His concerned expression didn’t fade despite the confusion in his tone.

“Garlic and onions are supposed to be peeled before you cook them because the skin isn’t edible!” She stared at him in disbelief. “You don’t mean that you didn’t peel them first?”

His stripes darkened as he averted his gaze from her and looked down at his hands. “I… oh Zaros…”

Tiny Azzanadra was frantically examining Jaina from where he stood on her shoulder, grabbing handfuls of her hair to peek between them. “Has it made you ill, my snowdrop? If I or my larger counterpart is responsible for giving you something unpalatable to humans…”

“I promise I’m fine,” Jaina insisted, stroking the little doll’s head to calm him down. “The peel isn’t poisonous or anything, just inedible!”

Akthanakos gave a hearty chuckle. “Your culinary prowess strikes again, brother dear! In fact, Jaina, this reminds me of his first ever attempt to cook!”

Azzanadra’s stripes merely darkened further. “Is this really the time, Akthanakos?”

Jaina was only half paying attention as she carefully examined the heap of vegetables for anything else inedible. “Cabbage, really? Wait, this isn’t cabbage at all… huh… corn leaves? Those aren’t edible either… And these beans are dry! Beans have to be soaked overnight and boiled in water before you eat them.” The fish, at least, looked safe to eat, so she set to work on them. Indeed, they tasted good enough save for being a little dry and slightly burned.

Azzanadra sighed, shaking his head. “It seems I was more ignorant of matters than I should have been… How foolish I was!” His stripes were still nearly black, and although his voice had a note of anger to it, he looked strangely saddened, as if his pride had been severely wounded. She knew complaining would make things worse; she had to comfort him, hold him.

“Please, don’t be upset…” She tucked the quietly purring Tiny Azzanadra into the blankets on her left side and stretched out her hand towards her beloved. “You wanted to make a nice surprise for me, right? And you wanted to surprise the children too?”

“Indeed, as well as to prepare for the times when I will need to feed them.” Reluctantly he glanced up at her and moved to stand closer to her side. “It is… fortunate that you did not see what became of the bread. I have already thoroughly cleaned up your oven…”

“You were far more successful this time, at least,” Akthanakos said reassuringly. “It seems she can actually eat most of it!”

Tiny Azzanadra pulled himself up and onto the tray to examine its contents. “She can? You are sure most of this is fit for human consumption?”

“The fish and fruit have been perfectly fine, yes.” Jaina found her curiosity getting the better of her again. “What happened the first time he cooked, if I may?” she asked, squeezing Azzanadra’s hand. “Or would you rather he not discuss it, beloved?”

Azzanadra seemed to relax at her touch, his gaze softening a bit. “There is no harm in him telling the story. I must learn from my mistakes, for our children’s sake!”

“Very well.” Akthanakos cleared his throat and rested comfortably in the chair. “I am unsure if you know this already, but when we were new to the empire, Azzanadra’s predecessor as Pontifex Maximus, a human, was still head of the church. He was a man of great intellect and fortitude, quickly earning the respect of the Mahjarrat who became pontifices! Well, there was one winter where he fell ill and was confined to bed, and the priests believed that his favorite dish—a hot seafood soup—would help aid in his recovery!”

Jaina nodded and bit into a chunk of strawberry, although she had to spit out the sprout on top that had been left in. “I do know, yes. I think Azzanadra said once that he was the twentieth to hold the position?”

Akthanakos nodded. “Anyhow, that was when Azzanadra sought to take matters into his own hands. He stormed the temple kitchens and took the poor cooks completely by surprise! I heard he threw everything into a cauldron without rhyme or reason and tried to use fire magic to heat it, and that the soup boiled over at one point! The cooks protested, of course, but he paid them no mind—and when his predecessor tasted the soup? Well, it made him a different kind of ill, to say the least! Fortunately he recovered quickly and was back on his feet in no time. Still, the cardinals and human priests whispered for the next thousand years about what terrible things would befall Senntisten should His Holiness ever set foot in a kitchen again!”

“I have, at least, learned from my previous failings,” Azzanadra pointed out, his stripes darkening once more. “The question now remains, how might I correct the mistakes I have presently made?”

“We must find out more about what humans can and cannot eat!” Tiny Azzanadra puffed out his chest. “I shall discuss it with Jaina and compile the knowledge in a tiny journal!”

That sparked an idea in Jaina’s mind, and she sat up straighter, her eyes lighting up eagerly. “Wait, I know! I… I could show you how to cook?”

Akthanakos uttered a surprised gasp, and Azzanadra hesitated, seeming to ponder her words before he spoke again. “Indeed, I had not considered that possibility!” His dark eyes seemed to be brightening up a little. “Perhaps some time after the children are born then?”

"And I as well wish to learn from you!" Tiny Azzanadra added. "A small effort from the Pontifex Minimus, which will yield not-at-all-small results!"

“As soon as possible! And yes, you can help too if you like.” The adventurer smiled broadly up at him, squeezing his hand tightly. “You've taught me so much, shown me so much. Now, my beloved, I think it’s my turn to teach you a thing or two!”

**Author's Note:**

> This was meant to be done in two or three days at most, but then I got stuck at several intervals double-checking everything and had to rewrite parts drastically... comical lighthearted stuff is a whole lot harder than it looks! :whew: The latter half might be a little too dialogue-heavy and still need polish given that I really wanted to post this a lot sooner than I did...
> 
> I've long been attached to the headcanon that Azzanadra is a terrible, terrible cook. (And why wouldn't most of the Mahjarrat be, given that they don't need to eat and therefore don't have much reason to learn to cook, and even those that would eat for pleasure or social reasons would probably have had human servants to do it, at least in the empire...) Well, after sharing that little idea with others who were all too happy to run with it, well, I knew I'd be remiss if I didn't write about it! Also, more tiny Mahjarrat shenanigans because we can never have too much of those...
> 
> Originally I was going to have Strawberry the baby troll appear in the latter half of the fic and graciously eat what Jaina couldn't, but I wanted to keep things short and too many characters in a scene is tough to keep track of! (Let's say he woke up just after where this fic leaves off and was happy to eat the stuff Jaina couldn't stomach.)
> 
> Speaking of Minijarrats, I've been wanting to touch on flashbacks to Azzanadra's childhood a bit more, and the story Akthanakos told from their childhood days is just one of many ideas I've had about the little Mahjarrat growing up on Freneskae! Originally it was going to be Azzy's little brother who was in the greatest peril, but I ultimately went for it being Sliske in order to show that even he can be vulnerable and scared at times--even if he was still a sneaky two-timing bastard as a kid!
> 
> Feedback is always appreciated, and I hope you enjoy!


End file.
